The present invention comprises three fundamental aspects: in the first place, the organisation of the UWB transmitters/receptors into a group of cells (UWB cells), as a complementary or replacement transmission system for other cell systems such as GSM (Global System for Mobile communications), UMTS (Universal Mobile Telephone System) or equivalents, in the second place, a joint control method for the UWB devices that allows roaming between said UWB cells, and in the third place, the spectral monitoring of the UWB signals present in the radioelectric environment by means of the steps of transmitter identification and spectral analysis of the signal generated by those transmitters.
No system or technique is known that describes a cell organisation of UWB transmitters/receptors with a view to optimising their functioning as a whole. However, various devices and methods are known that use UWB signals in different applications, but these systems and the associated techniques turn out to be deficient with regards to the efficiency of the communication and can be improved by means of the object of this invention.
Published patent application number US2007093237 describes a mechanism for locating cellular devices, which can use UWB technology among others, with a view to transmitting information. This patent thus describes a localisation application that can be applied in UWB technology but that does not use any cellular control or organisation, which involves inefficiency in the communication.
Published patent application number EP1747616 describes a cellular device in GSM or UMTS technology wherein the main functioning lies in that grid in such a way that when the level of the GSM or UMTS signal is low—the system is in an area without coverage—switching of the communication to UWB technology occurs. In this way, UWB connectivity is used as a back-up mechanism, bearing in mind the potential interference of the 2G/3G signal, but without including cellular functionalities, which likewise implies the same limitation in terms of efficiency as the application described in the previous section.
On a separate note, published patent application number WO03084259 describes a UWB communication system designed to monitor the location of people, in particular children, by means of a wrist device. As in the previous case, this patent describes a simple application of the combination of UWB technology together with the GPS (Global Positioning System) satellite technology and one that does not contain its cellular configuration and likewise having the same limitations in the efficiency of the communication.
At the same time, published patent application number GB2399475 describes a mechanism that facilitates the concurrent use of conventional 2G/3G cellular technologies minimising the interferences between the two. This application, likewise, does not describe the possibility of a cellular configuration, meaning that it presents the same limitations with regards to the efficiency of the communication as the patents described in the preceding paragraphs.
It has been considered that it would be convenient to establish a method and device that solves, at least in part, some of the problems or inconveniences presented by the known systems.